Printing 101 - AKA how to save paper and cartridges

Posted in on February 19, 2015.

As many of you know one of the best pros of Cloudsfactory is that we sell digital patterns. This means that, just few seconds after your purchase, you will be able to download the file and to start stitching without having to wait for the mailman. We care about environment and also about your pocket, so here you can find some tricks to use our patterns without waisting paper and money on ink cartridges.

Print in black and white
Our cross stitch charts are made in colors to be easy to read and to make you sure you're always using the right color. Anyway for those who prefer black and white charts or that simply want to save their color cartridges, our patterns looks good end easy to follow even if printed in black and white!
Every printer is different, but usually you will find a "black and white" or "grayscale" option between the Color options.

Print only some pages
Cloudsfactory patterns have a cover page with the image and the pattern size as well as a color key page. Anyway if you have any kind of device near you that is able to read PDFs (smartphone, tablet, computer, ...) you can avoid to print this pages and just open them on your device when you need them.
To print just some pages look for "page range" or just "pages" on your printer options. The standard option is "All", but there you can just write the pages range to print. So, if you write 2-5, it will print from page 2 to page 5.

Print at low quality
To print at draft quality will save a lot of ink. Color and symbols will be still visible as Cloudsfactory patterns are thought to be big enough to be readable at every printing quality.

Use your device to read the pattern
Our charts are downloadable in PDF format, so almost every "modern" device is able to open them. We also have some "devices friendly" options for our bigger patterns, that allows you to have the entire pattern and the color key in a single page! Using this option, your stitching will be 100% free and environment friendly!
You can read more about this patterns HERE.

Last but not least: reuse your paper!
Once you have done with the pattern, unless you store it for your collection, don't throw it away! You can use the back side of the paper to take notes, doodle while you're at the phone, or for some child's pieces of art!